The evening's entertainment distracted Fraser for a while from his increasing irritation and anxiety. He surprised Ray by joining in and shouting at the ball game, even throwing a french fry at the screen in irritation as the referee missed a foul. After the food had been consumed and the ball game over a suitably asinine movie was decided on, and the friends groaned and laughed as the action movie clichés kept on coming.

"You know Benny, maybe it's not that unlikely. I've seen you do some pretty weird stuff..."

"To the best of my knowledge I've never successfully prevented a helicopter from taking off by wrapping a chain around it as anchor."

"What, you've tried it and failed?"

Fraser laughed. "No. No, my main adventures with helicopters involved falling out of them."

"You make a habit of falling out of helicopters?"

"Well, I didn't fall so much as I was pushed, and it only happened once. The other occasion... well, that was just a fluke accident."

Ray shook his head, trying not to grin. Benny had a really entertaining way of telling a story. A companionable silence fell for a while, interrupted by laughter at the television. Finally the film finished. Ray took a last pull on his beer, and looked across at Fraser. His friend had fallen asleep, sitting on the floor with his back propped up against the sofa.

"Told you pizza and TV would do the trick," Ray said to his friend, and grinned fondly.

At that moment Ray's mobile phone chirped. Cursing he hurried to answer it before it woke up the sleeper. "Yeah, Vecchio," he snapped. "This had better be important this time of the night."

"We have a missing person's report needs looking into. It could be a big one... she's local royalty, her parents have a lot of clout." Lieutenant Welsh's voice sounded even more sandpapery than usual at this time of night. "We need as many people on this as possible."

Ray groaned. He understood the urgency of helping any missing person, but it always upset him when wealth and politics afforded some people better police protection than others. "Alright, I'm coming in."

Hoping that he wouldn't wake his friend, Ray covered Fraser with one of Ma's throws. "Come on fellah," he grunted and lifted the sleeping figure, dumping him on the sofa. "Yeah, no thanks necessary," he complained. He should have remembered how heavy the guy was... "You're welcome." Fraser grumbled in his sleep and tossed the covering aside. "Don't blame me if you wake up cold," Ray counselled his friend. Well, time for him to go. He wrote a note and stuck it to the television, telling Fraser where he was. For a moment he worried. Despite the chilled out evening, Fraser hadn't looked entirely well to him. They'd had a laugh, yes... but Fraser seemed to be rambling a bit, just a little bit scattered. It was a shame Ray had to work tonight... then he shook his head. Nah... don't be daft. Fraser's a big boy, he told himself. He can take care of himself.

...

Fraser opened his eyes carefully. He was in the Vecchio's kitchen, a pile of cabbage leaves in front of him, a needle and thread. It was obviously a dream, but at least it didn't appear to be someone else's afterlife.

"Hello?" He looked around checking for any place where a phantom could hide. "You there Dad?"

Apparently he was alone. He wandered in and out of the Vecchio's rooms, and found himself sleeping awkwardly sprawled on the sofa. He tried kicking himself awake, and only succeeded in hurting his big toe. Where had Ray gone? What was he supposed to do here? He saw a note with his name written on it stuck to the television, but when he tried to pick it up his hand went right through.

This made no sense. Then, shrugging, he resigned himself to the illogic of dreams. He returned to the kitchen, sat at the table, and, for no reason that he could identify, began to sew the cabbage leaves together.

After all, it could be no less futile than dry cleaning.

…

Outside the Vecchio's apartment an insignificant looking little man made a sweep of the neighbourhood, and checked his audio equipment again. Simmon's job description was listed as "private detective", but he was currently working in another capacity altogether. He wasn't fussy how he made his money, so long as he got paid.

He had been listening, with some irritation, to the target and his friend talking to each other about the film, and so far he didn't have anything he could share to encourage his employer. The man had been very specific about how much he had wanted Fraser to suffer, and transcripts of him laughing at sports and movies while eating pizza and French fries wouldn't satisfy that particular want. Simmons knew that he had to have some demonstrable success soon, or he would find himself in serious trouble. He didn't like to think what kind of trouble that would be, given who he was working for. The target's friend had left about ten minutes earlier. There had been no sounds since.

Suddenly his machine started to click again, as a voice started up in the living room. It was the target, talking aloud. Simmons twiddled the dial, homing in on the frequency until he got a clear tone through his ear piece. He turned the corner from the Vecchio residence, and listened attentively to the man's voice. He seemed to be speaking either absolute nonsense, or a rather odd sounding foreign language. Simmons shook his head. He couldn't figure it out, having no linguistic background at all. His studies had all been forensic, chemical, observational, scientific. Ask him to cut up a frog or identify a poison, he was your man.

Like any good scientist he kept a record of his experiments.

He was sure now that the toxin was working. As well as being the result his employer wanted this gave Simmon's a great deal of personal satisfaction.

He smiled. Not a cruel smile. He didn't look like someone capable of slowly poisoning another human being for money. He looked like any other middle aged man smiling with pride at a job well done.

…

Meg Thatcher arrived at her desk fashionably late (she had very good reasons) and irate.

"Where's my coffee?" she demanded of Turnbull.

"Constable Fraser brought it earlier, but since you weren't here we couldn't enter your office... so your coffee is..." Turnbull trailed off for a moment, "here," he concluded, handing her a Styrofoam cup of lukewarm brown fluid. Meg smelled it, and pulled a face.

"Thank you," she replied, and taking the coffee cup dumped the whole thing into Turnbull's waste paper basket.

"So, where is Constable Fraser?"

"He's working in his office, Sir. Do you want me to get him?"

Meg nodded curtly. Turnbull rose, and darted off to find his colleague.

Meg sighed, stepping up to the coffee machine. She filled her own mug, took a gulp, and dropped her tense shoulders. There were times when she hated having to be so much nastier and more aggressive than a man, simply in order to win the respect her rank was due. Perhaps she was underestimating her current subordinates, but in her experience a woman had to try twice as hard to get half as far as a man. She knew she had a reputation as a hard hearted stone cold harridan, and to be honest, she was proud of that reputation. She had to protect herself somehow.

Turnbull seemed to be taking his time. What was Fraser doing now? Quietly Meg swore, placing her drink on the counter, and stalked off to find the men herself. She suspected Fraser of passive aggressive attempts to sabotage her... oh, very subtly done of course, but very very clever. There was that whole issue around his refusal to park up at the recent ambassadorial party for example. She couldn't reprimand him, because how could she reprimand someone for driving safely, and refusing to park illegally? Still, she was pretty sure she knew what the guy's game was.

"Constable Fraser..." she stepped sharply through the door, only to be blocked by Turnbull.

"Uhm, sir... if I might... there are some things I meant to talk with you about regarding the visit from the mayor of …."

"It can wait," Meg snapped, and pushed through.

Fraser was lying on his front, face propped in his hands, wearing trousers, shirt and braces, with his boots flopping sadly by a chair on which his Stetson had been tossed. It was disconcertingly like discovering him naked. His face was rather flushed, and he was muttering to himself as he peered intently at newspapers, which were scattered across the carpet.

"Constable Fraser!" Meg snapped at him in her most austere tones. "What exactly do you think you're doing?"

"Ah, yes..." he looked up at her from his position on the floor, but made no move to get to his feet. "I'm looking for her."

"For who?"

"For whom," he corrected her pedantically.

She rolled her eyes. Who followed that grammatical rule any more? "Constable Fraser, with all due regard for your superb syntax, I am not an eighteenth century novel. Do you mind telling me what you're doing on the floor?"

"Oh," he looked puzzled, then embarrassed. "Oh dear. I appear to be lying on the floor. Excuse me." Rapidly he stood, swaying for a moment, before steadying.

She peered at him intently, trying to figure out if he was pulling a fast one, or if there was actually something wrong.

"Constable, are you feeling entirely well?"

"Oh, yes Sir, I'm fine. Everything is fine. Except the cabbage leaves." He looked puzzled for a moment, and his line of vision shifted. "I'm sorry Sir, I have no idea what I'm talking about."

Meg decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. She couldn't see how this performance stood to gain him anything, and she smelled no alcohol on his breath.

"Constable Fraser, I suggest you see a doctor."

"Thank you Sir, I'd prefer not to."

"Then it's not a suggestion, it's an order."

"Yes Sir."

Thatcher took Turnbull by the arm and marched him to the front desk. "See to it that he gets a doctor, and if I find out that you two are up to anything, you will both live to regret it."

Turnbull nodded, and swallowed. He was in awe of Thatcher, she was a force of nature, unstoppable. He was also, quite frankly, terrified.

"I'm on it, Sir," he said, admiringly.

She gave him one of her more pointed looks, and entered her office to start the day's work.

…

"Who are you looking for, son?"

"The girl," Fraser said, staring down at the newspapers arranged around his feet. "Sally Cooper, the missing girl."

"It's not your job, is it?"

"Isn't it?"

"You don't look well, son, I think you should let the Yanks do their job."

Fraser shook his head. Last night he had wakened from a ridiculous dream to find himself sleeping crookedly and painfully on the Vecchio couch. Ray was gone, and for several moments Fraser had thought that he was still sleeping. However, this time when he reached out to unpeel the sticky note from the television it had come off in his hand. Peering through the kitchen door Fraser ascertained that there were no cabbage leaves in sight, so he looked at the note, and discovered that Ray was working.

Well, he had to help his friend.

It hadn't gone well...

His mind wandering he stood blinking at the floor. Oh dear, he thought, what am I doing?

For a full moment his mind was completely blank.

His father spoke again. "Son, sit down before you fall down."

"She's missing, I'm supposed to help Ray." He sat down, to his father's relief, and continued to stare. He rubbed his forehead hard, pushing the knuckles into it, as he attempted to puzzle out... well, whatever it was that was puzzling him.

"He won't let me help him. I don't know, did I do something? He told me to go home." The expression on Fraser's face cut his father to the core. It was hurt, and childlike. The expression he had seen on his face when he was ten and the boy's "best friend" had turned on him in a particularly nasty way. Benton was obviously thinking that his friend Ray was doing the same thing.

"Son, your Yank friend is only looking out for you. You're not well."

"I'm perfectly well," Fraser snapped. "I just need people to shut up and let me think."

The ghost stood silent. Fraser continued to stare at the newspapers. "Go away," Fraser said, under his breath. "I don't want you."

This sounded nothing like his son, but the ghost obliged. When Fraser lifted his aching head to look where his father had stood, the man was gone. Fraser covered his eyes and groaned.

…

"I'm telling you, he was acting strange, even weirder than usual." Gardino was sitting at his desk, hunched, trying to hide his mobile phone from sight. The attempt was unsuccessful, given the size of the phone, and rather than drawing less attention to himself he suddenly discovered that he was trapped under the distinctly angry glare of Detective Ray Vecchio.

"Uhm... yeah, thanks for that information, yeah, I'll remember to write it down. Thank you..." Hanging up Gardino hoped that Ray would believe his attempted cover up. But there was no getting away from it.

Ray was sitting on the edge of Gardino's desk, leaning in a little bit too closely, and looking murderous. "You're a gossip, Gardino," Ray continued to stare.

Gardino shifted uncomfortably. "I beg your pardon?"

"Just shut your big yap. Do you think you can do that?"

Gardino attempted to look nonchalant. "I don't know what you're talking about detective."

Ray continued his dirty look, until the other man looked away shiftily, and muttering excuses about needing to be somewhere, made his way out of the nearest door, while attempting to look busy.

"Vecchio, a word." The Lieutenant gestured him in. With a sigh Ray stood and marched into the office.

"Yes sir?"

"Am I correct that your partner had a … how shall I put it, a 'melt down' last night?"

"He's been under a bit of stress..."

"I'm under stress Vecchio. However, I somehow manage not to empty an entire filing cabinet and tape it across the length and breadth of the squad room's floor."

"Yes sir, I can see that sir."

"So... tell me that this is just some Canadian outback forensic technique that I've never heard of."

Ray looked at his feet. Fraser's arrival at the precinct had been excruciatingly embarrassing. So much so that Ray had lost his temper and practically shouted at his friend to leave. If there was one thing he didn't want, it was spiteful gossip about Benny circulating through the station. He had hoped that he'd managed to get him out of there in time, but Gardino's overheard conversation proved otherwise. People were laughing at his friend.

There was a lump in his throat. He didn't know what to tell the Lieutenant, so decided to say nothing.

"I mean, we all use flow charts and such like," the Lieutenant continued, obviously looking for a shred of an excuse. "Could that have been what he was doing?"

Ray wanted dearly to believe that was what had happened. Continuing to look at his feet he managed to produce an unconvincing lie.

"I suppose it's a possibility."

"A possibility?"

"Yes sir, a possibility."

Welsh looked at his detective, and let out a sigh born of deep frustration. He'd like to be able to put Ray up for commendations and promotions... his work was surely good enough. But for every success he and the Mounty had, there was always something that put them firmly back in the department's black books. This felt like one of those occasions.

"Okay. Well, keep him away from the squad room till he's prepared to be sensible. Here in America we like to keep our filing filed."

"Yes sir."

Welsh glared across the desk. "Dismissed."

Ray turned smartly, and left the room.

…

And somewhere, hidden amidst a muddle of warehouses and container trucks, Sally Cooper has just lost control of her bladder. She lies on the concrete floor, bound hand and foot, and weeps.

When the man comes in again she knows he's telling her the truth. His jeering smile, his cold eyes, they say it all.

There is nobody coming for her. She's all alone.